2015年2月8日 星期日

Special Forces Part 4 - The Cafres

Above: Details of a map published in 1679 in Nuremberg showing Cafreria, the homeland of the Cafres. The geographic location matches the southern portion of present-day South Africa plus part of southern Namibia. To its north was Monomotapa. [Note: around 1420, 鄭和Cheng He and his fleet visited Monomotapa and were well received by the royal court. Among the gifts from Cheng to the kingdom were horses and gunpowder. Some folks there later became experts of gunpowder-powered firearms.]

It remains a great mystery as to what happened to the Cafres, the Black Rifle battalion, after the fall of Ming-Cheng Tung-Ning Kingdom in 1683. They had previously served both Koxinga's father 鄭芝龍 and Koxinga himself well in combats and as personal/palace guards.

The last known action of the Cafres was to follow Lady Tung's order and execute Cheng Jing's illegitimate son Cheng Ke-Chang to make way for the younger, lineage-based heir-apparent Cheng Ke-Shuang. This would have occurred near the end of the Tung-Ning era (ca 1682-3).

It is highly doubtful that the Cafres were allowed to stay in Taiwan since all Ming-Cheng soldiers were forced to penal colonies in China. It is also equally doubtful that they were repatriated back to Cafreria as freemen, if ever. Assimilation into the general population remains a possibility since some had married Han women; although this is yet to be verified.